Saudi Arabia - visa?

[Travelnplane]

Does anyone has successfully obtained the Transit Visa sea on visa.mofa.gov.sa and if yes, how long did it take from application to approval?

 

Have entered our applications almost two weeks ago and paid everything but the status remains unchanged as „under process“…

Getting closer to our departure date and starting to worry a bit.

[nuvolablue]

2 hours ago, Travelnplane said:

Does anyone has successfully obtained the Transit Visa sea on visa.mofa.gov.sa and if yes, how long did it take from application to approval?

 

Have entered our applications almost two weeks ago and paid everything but the status remains unchanged as „under process“…

Getting closer to our departure date and starting to worry a bit.

Yes mine has been the same under process status for around three weeks now. 

The embassy don't answer the phone and don't answer emails. 

I will give it another week tops and then apply for the more expensive tourist visa. 

 

[little britain]

8 hours ago, nuvolablue said:

Yes mine has been the same under process status for around three weeks now. 

The embassy don't answer the phone and don't answer emails. 

I will give it another week tops and then apply for the more expensive tourist visa. 

 

I got the full tourist visa ( about £125 😬 ) and it was approved and issued instantly if that helps. 

[Travelnplane]

Thank you. Which phone number did you enter for the Tourist visa and what address? The number 00966920011114 which MSC provided was considered invalid. 

 

Did you use visa.visitsaudi.com?

Edited December 3, 2022 by Travelnplane

[little britain]

4 hours ago, Travelnplane said:

Thank you. Which phone number did you enter for the Tourist visa and what address? The number 00966920011114 which MSC provided was considered invalid. 

 

Did you use visa.visitsaudi.com?

Yes - visit Saudi.com

 

I am actually visiting friends in Saudi after the cruise so I used their address and phone etc 

[Stormy Dan]

On 12/2/2022 at 8:36 PM, Travelnplane said:

Does anyone has successfully obtained the Transit Visa sea on visa.mofa.gov.sa and if yes, how long did it take from application to approval?

 

Have entered our applications almost two weeks ago and paid everything but the status remains unchanged as „under process“…

Getting closer to our departure date and starting to worry a bit.

Hi Travelnplane, did u ever get your transit visa? 

[Stormy Dan]

On 11/26/2022 at 4:13 PM, Newleno said:

Just got off the splendida in Jeddah, I dont know of one person that was able to obtain the transit visa for $50,   Although we all tried

So did u not have a Saudi visa to join the ship or did you have to apply for the more expensive tourist visa? 

[little britain]

Her first revenue sailing is today!

Hopefully someone will come back and give us the definitive answer on visas!  

[Noncon]

Ours has been on the"processing" state since 11/29. Currently on W.E. and dropped by the Excursion desk. Asked about Damman  but they didn't have any information about the Visa. 

Also we were supposed to push off an hour ago, but we still here (Doha). There's got to be a thousand people lined up on the shore, waiting to see the ship off.  Oh well, just one of those things. We still expect to be in Dubai at the schedule time.

[little britain]

9 minutes ago, Noncon said:

Ours has been on the"processing" state since 11/29. Currently on W.E. and dropped by the Excursion desk. Asked about Damman  but they didn't have any information about the Visa. 

Also we were supposed to push off an hour ago, but we still here (Doha). There's got to be a thousand people lined up on the shore, waiting to see the ship off.  Oh well, just one of those things. We still expect to be in Dubai at the schedule time.

Sure they will get it sorted! When are you in Saudi?

Bon voyage! 

[Nikita4]

1 hour ago, Noncon said:

Ours has been on the"processing" state since 11/29. Currently on W.E. and dropped by the Excursion desk. Asked about Damman  but they didn't have any information about the Visa. 

Also we were supposed to push off an hour ago, but we still here (Doha). There's got to be a thousand people lined up on the shore, waiting to see the ship off.  Oh well, just one of those things. We still expect to be in Dubai at the schedule time.

My visas are processing since yesterday… i will call tomorrow to the saudi embassy in Berne and hope they will work.

 

Bon voyage! We will embark 12/31 !

[Noncon]

6 hours ago, little britain said:

Sure they will get it sorted! When are you in Saudi?

Bon voyage! 

Hi LB, on 12/28.

 

[Lisichka]

[Newleno]

15 hours ago, Stormy Dan said:

So did u not have a Saudi visa to join the ship or did you have to apply for the more expensive tourist visa? 

Long story, look up my previous posts, I applied for transit visa  three weeks before embarkation, nothing happened so I got a real visa because MSC customer service told me I needed a visa to board and that it was my responsibility to know the visa requirements.  I am still waiting for someone to post if they ever were able to get the transit visa.  It has been over 3 weeks since my cruise ended. I still dont know of one person that received a transit visa.  Maybe you will be on the cruise in which MSC and Saudi gets their act together.  Good Luck.

[Nikita4]

2 hours ago, Lisichka said:

From where do you have this information?

[Nikita4]

5 minutes ago, Newleno said:

Long story, look up my previous posts, I applied for transit visa  three weeks before embarkation, nothing happened so I got a real visa because MSC customer service told me I needed a visa to board and that it was my responsibility to know the visa requirements.  I am still waiting for someone to post if they ever were able to get the transit visa.  It has been over 3 weeks since my cruise ended. I still dont know of one person that received a transit visa.  Maybe you will be on the cruise in which MSC and Saudi gets their act together.  Good Luck.

You were on a MSC Splendida Cruise in the red sea with Jeddah? There are no Dammam cruises until 12/28 because of the world cup.

[Lisichka]

18 minutes ago, Nikita4 said:

You were on a MSC Splendida Cruise in the red sea with Jeddah? There are no Dammam cruises until 12/28 because of the world cup.

The lWorld Cup is over.  The first cruise on the Europa left today and was set to stop in Damman on 12/28. Because of Visa issues the stop in SA has been canceled.  That screenshot is from MSC directly.

Edited December 21, 2022 by Lisichka

[Nikita4]

10 minutes ago, Lisichka said:

The lWorld Cup is over.  The first cruise on the Europa left today and was set to stop in Damman on 12/28. Because of Visa issues the stop in SA has been canceled.  That screenshot is from MSC directly.

I know that they start to cruise to SA today. But on which MSC page do you find this Info? We are booked on the next World Europa cruise to SA and dont have informations like that. Also the cruises in the red sea goes to SA in the moment.

[Lisichka]

55 minutes ago, Nikita4 said:

I know that they start to cruise to SA today. But on which MSC page do you find this Info? We are booked on the next World Europa cruise to SA and dont have informations like that. Also the cruises in the red sea goes to SA in the moment.

I would do your own research for your particular cruise.  If you are on the next one I doubt it will go to SA.  The Visa issues are just not being resolved in a timely manner.

[Noncon]

6 hours ago, Lisichka said:

Ok thanks! I haven't seen that information yet. I checked with the excursion desk this morning and they were offering no excursion to Damman due to visa issue, so its probably in the process of being replaced.

[Nikita4]

40 minutes ago, Noncon said:

Ok thanks! I haven't seen that information yet. I checked with the excursion desk this morning and they were offering no excursion to Damman due to visa issue, so its probably in the process of being replaced.

Noncon, so you dont know anything about the change of port?

I didnt found anything on the swiss or german MSC Website about the change.

[little britain]

6 hours ago, Lisichka said:

The lWorld Cup is over.  The first cruise on the Europa left today and was set to stop in Damman on 12/28. Because of Visa issues the stop in SA has been canceled.  That screenshot is from MSC directly.

If you look to book 12/24 departure from Dubai on MSC UK site it still shows Damman as the port call on 12/28…🤷‍♀️

[alicat58]

Disembarked Splendida on Sunday. We managed to get our Saudi visas quite easily before leaving. Just printed them out. Also got a refund from MSC as we had a fly cruise. The customs on arrival was quite intense. Photo and finger prints taken.

 

I will do a review on our cruise and our impressions. Just need to get some Christmas stuff out of the way and I am also back at work for the next two days.

 

Alicat

[Newleno]

3 hours ago, alicat58 said:

Disembarked Splendida on Sunday. We managed to get our Saudi visas quite easily before leaving. Just printed them out. Also got a refund from MSC as we had a fly cruise. The customs on arrival was quite intense. Photo and finger prints taken.

 

I will do a review on our cruise and our impressions. Just need to get some Christmas stuff out of the way and I am also back at work for the next two days.

 

Alicat

So you were able to get the transit visa for $50 instead of the real visa for $142?

[Lisichka]

4 hours ago, alicat58 said:

Disembarked Splendida on Sunday. We managed to get our Saudi visas quite easily before leaving. Just printed them out. Also got a refund from MSC as we had a fly cruise. The customs on arrival was quite intense. Photo and finger prints taken.

 

I will do a review on our cruise and our impressions. Just need to get some Christmas stuff out of the way and I am also back at work for the next two days.

 

Alicat

Did you get a transit visa or regular visa? I understand the regular visas are easy to get but upwards of $150pp